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UNDERWOODS 



[Author's Edition.] 



BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 



AN INLAND VOYAGE. 

EDINBURGH: PICTURESQUE NOTES. 

TRAVELS WITH A DONKEY. 

VIRGINIBUS PUERISQUE. 

FAMILIAR STUDIES OF MEN AND BOOKS. 

NEW ARABIAN NIGHTS. 

TREASURE ISLAND. 

THE SILVERADO SQUATTERS. 

A CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES. 

STRANGE CASE OF DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. 

PRINCE OTTO. 

KIDNAPPED. 

THE MERRY MEN. 

(With Mrs. Stevenson) 
MORE NEW ARABIAN NIGHTS: THE DYNAMITER. 



UNDERWOODS 



BY 

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 



b 



CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
1887 



v 







A 



Of all my verse, like not a single line ; 

But like my title, for it is not mine. 

That title from a better man I stole : 

Ah, how much better, had I stol'n the 7vhole I 



DEDICATION 

There are men and classes of men that stand above 
the common herd : the soldier, the sailor, and the shep- 
herd not unfrequently ; the artist rarely; rarelier still, 
the clergyman ; the physician almost as a rule. He is 
the flower (such as it is) of our civilisation ; and when 
that stage of man is done with, and only remembered 
to be marvelled at in history, he will be thought to 
have shared as little as any in the defects of the period, 
and most notably exhibited the virtues of the race. 
Generosity he has, such as is possible to those who 
practise an art, never to those who drive a trade ; dis- 
cretion, tested by a hundred secrets; tact, tried in a 
thousand embarrassments ; and what are more impor- 
tant, Heraclean cheerfulness and courage. So it is that 



vi DEDICATION 

he brings air and cheer into the sick-room, and often 
enough, though not so often as he wishes, brings healing. 

Gratitude is but a lame sentiment; thanks, when 
they are expressed, are often more embarrassing than 
welcome ; and yet I must set forth mine to a few out of 
many doctors who have brought me comfort and help : 
to Dr. Willey of San Francisco, whose kindness to a 
stranger it must be as grateful to him, as it is touching 
to me, to remember ; to Dr. Karl Ruedi of Davos, the 
good genius of the English in his frosty mountains; to 
Dr. Herbert of Paris, whom I knew only for a week, 
and to Dr. Caissot of Montpellier, whom I knew only 
for ten days, and who have yet wntten their names 
deeply in my memory; to Dr. Brandt of Royat; to 
Dr. Wakefield of Nice; to Dr. Chepmell, whose visits 
make it a pleasure to be ill ; to Dr. Horace Dobell, so 
wise in counsel ; to Sir Andrew Clark, so unwearied in 
kindness; and to that wise youth, my uncle, Dr. Balfour. 

I forget as many as I remember ; and I ask both 
to pardon me, these for silence, those for inadequate 
speech. But one name I have kept on purpose to the 



DEDICATION vii 

last, because it is a household word with me, and 
because if I had not received favours from so many- 
hands and in so many quarters of the world, it should 
have stood upon this page alone : that of my friend 
Thomas Bodley Scott of Bournemouth. Will he accept 
this, although shared among so many, for a dedication 
to himself? and when next my ill-fortune (which has 
thus its pleasant side) brings him hurrying to me when 
he would fain sit down to meat or lie down to rest, will 
he care to remember that he takes this trouble for one 

who is not fool enough to be ungrateful ? 

R. L. S. 
Skerryvore, 

Bournemouth. 



NOTE 

The human conscience has fled of late the troublesome 
domain of conduct for what I should have supposed to 
be the less congenial field of art : there she may now be 
said to rage, and with special severity in all that touches 
dialect ; so that in every novel the letters of the alpha- 
bet are tortured, and the reader wearied, to commemo- 
rate shades of mispronunciation. Now spelling is an art 
of great difficulty in my eyes, and I am inclined to lean 
upon the printer, even in common practice, rather than 
to venture abroad upon new quests. And the Scots 
tongue has an orthography of its own, lacking neither 
" authority nor author." Yet the temptation is great to 
lend a little guidance to the bewildered Englishman. 
Some simple phonetic artifice might defend your verses 
from barbarous mishandling, and yet not injure any 



x NOTE 

vested interest. So it seems at first; but there are 
rocks ahead. Thus, if I wish the diphthong ou to have 
its proper value, I may write oor instead of our ; many 
have done so and lived, and the pillars of the universe 
remained unshaken. But if I did so, and came presently 
to doun, which is the classical Scots spelling of the Eng- 
lish down, I should begin to feel uneasy ; and if I went 
on a little farther, and came to a classical Scots word, 
like stourox dour or clour, I should know precisely where 
I was — that is to say, that I was out of sight of land on 
those high seas of spelling reform in which so many 
strong swimmers have toiled vainly. To some the situ- 
ation is exhilarating; as for me, I give one bubbling 
cry and sink. The compromise at which I have ar- 
rived is indefensible, and I have no thought of trying 
to defend it. As I have stuck for the most part to the 
proper spelling, I append a table of some common 
vowel sounds which no one need consult ; and just to 
prove that I belong to my age and have in me the stuff 
of a reformer, I have used modification marks through- 
out. Thus I can tell myself, not without pride, that I 



NOTE xi 

have added a fresh stumbling-block for English readers, 
and to a page of print in my native tongue, have lent a 
new uncouthness. Sed non nobis. 

I note again, that among our new dialecticians, the 
local habitat of every dialect is given to the square 
mile. I could not emulate this nicety if I desired ; for 
I simply wrote my Scots as well as I was able, not car- 
ing if it hailed from Lauderdale or Angus, from the 
Mearns or Galloway ; if I had ever heard a good word, 
I used it without shame ; and when Scots was lacking, 
or the rhyme jibbed, I was glad (like my betters) to fall 
back on English. For all that, I own to a friendly feel- 
ing for the tongue of Fergusson and of Sir Walter, both 
Edinburgh men ; and I confess that Burns has always 
sounded in my ear like something partly foreign. And 
indeed I am from the Lothians myself; it is there I 
heard the language spoken about my childhood ; and it 
is in the drawling Lothian voice that I repeat it to my- 
self. Let the precisians call my speech that of the 
Lothians. And if it be not pure, alas ! what matters 
it ? The day draws near when this illustrious and 



xii NOTE 

malleable tongue shall be quite forgotten ; and Burns's 
Ayrshire, and Dr. Macdonald's Aberdeen-awa', and 
Scott's brave, metropolitan utterance will be all equally 
the ghosts of speech. Till then I would love to have 
my hour as a native Maker, and be read by my own 
countryfolk in our own dying language : an ambition 
surely rather of the heart than of the head, so restricted 
as it is in prospect of endurance, so parochial in bounds 
of space. 



CONTENTS 



BOOK I.— In English 

PAGE 

I. Envoy — Go, little book I 

ii. A Song of the Road — The gauger walked . . 2 

hi. The Canoe Speaks — On the great streams . . 4 

iv. It is the season ........ 7 

v. The House Beautiful — A naked house, a naked moor 9 
vi. A Visit from the Sea — Far from the loud sea 

beaches ......... 12 

VII. To A Gardener — Friend, in my mountain-side demesne 14 
VIII. To Minnie — A picture frame for you to fill . . 16 
IX. To K. de M. — A lover of the moorland bare . . 1 7 
V x. To N. V. de G. S.— The unfathomable sea . . 19 
xi. To Will. H. Low — Youth now flees . . .21 
xii. To Mrs. Will. H. Low — Even in the bluest noon- 
day of July ........ 24 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

xiii. To H. F. Brown — I sit and wait . . . .26 

xiv. To Andrew Lang — Dear Andrew . . . .29 

xv. Et tu in Arcadia vixisti — In ancient tales, O friend 31 

xvi. To W. E. Henley — The year runs through her phases 36 

xvii. Henry James — Who comes to-night . 



xviii. The Mirror Speaks — Where the bells 
xix. Katharine — We see you as we see a face 
XX. To F. J. S. — I read, dear friend . 
xxi. Requiem — Under the wide and starry sky 
xxii. The Celestial Surgeon — If I have faltered 
xxiii. Our Lady of the Snows — Out of the sun 

xxiv. Not yet, my soul 

xxv. It is not yours, O mother, to complain . 



xxvi. The Sick Child — O mother, lay your hand on my brow 56 



xxvii. In Memoriam F. A. S. — Yet, O stricken heart . 
xxviii. To my Father — Peace and her huge invasion . 
xxix. In the States — With half a heart . . 
xxx. A Portrait — I am a kind of farthing dip . 
XXXI. Sing clearlier, Muse ...... 

xxxii. A Camp — The bed was made .... 

xxxiii. The Country of the Camisards — We travelled in 
the print of olden wars ..... 

xxxiv. Skerryvore — For love of lovely words 
xxxv. Skerryvore : The Parallel — Here all is sunny 

xxxvi. My house, I say 

xxxvii. My body which my dungeon is ... 
xxxviii. Say not of me that weakly I declined . 



39 
4i 

42 

43 
44 
45 
5o 

53 



58 
60 
62 

63 
65 
66 

67 
68 
69 
70 
7i 
73 



CONTENTS 



BOOK II.— In Scots 

PAGE 

i. The Maker to Posterity — Far 'yont amang the 

years to be . . . . . . -77 

II. Ille Terrarum — Frae nirly, nippin', Eas'lan breeze 80 
III. When aince Aprile has fairly come . . . -85 

iv. A Mile an' a Bittock 87 

v. A Lowden Sabbath Morn — The clinkum-clank o' 

Sabbath bells 89 

vi. The Spaewife — O, I wad like to ken . . .98 
vii. The Blast — 1875 — It'srainin'. Weet'sthegairdensod 100 
viii. The Counterblast — 1886 — My bonny man, the 

warld, it's true 103 

ix. The Counterblast Ironical — It's strange that God 

should fash to frame . . . . . .108 

x. Their Laureate to an Academy Class Dinner 

Club — Dear Thamson class, whaure'er I gang . no 
xi. Embro Hie Kirk — The Lord Himsel' in former days 114 
xii. The Scotsman's Return from Abroad — In mony 

a foreign pairt I've been 118 

XIII. Late in the nicht 125 

xrv. My Conscience! — Of a' the ills that flesh can fear . 130 
xv. To Doctor John Brown — By Lyne and Tyne, by 

Thames and Tees ...... 133 

XVI. It's an owercome sooth for age an' youth . . . 138 



BOOK I.— In English 



I 

ENVOY 

Go, little book, and wish to all 

Flowers in the garden, meat in the hall, 

A bin of wine, a spice of wit, 

A house with lawns enclosing it, 

A living river by the door, 

A nightingale in the sycamore ! 



II 

A SONG OF THE ROAD 

The gauger walked with willing foot, 
And aye the gauger played the flute ; 
And what should Master Gauger play 
But Over the hills and far away ? 

Whene'er I buckle on my pack 
And foot it gaily in the track, 

pleasant gauger, long since dead, 

1 hear you fluting on ahead. 

You go with me the self-same way — 
The self-same air for me you play ; 
For I do think and so do you 
It is the tune to travel to. 



A SONG OF THE ROAD 

For who would gravely set his face 
To go to this or t'other place ? 
There's nothing under Heav'n so blue 
That's fairly worth the travelling to. 

On every hand the roads begin, 
And people walk with zeal therein ; 
But wheresoe'er the highways tend, 
Be sure there's nothing at the end. 

Then follow you, wherever hie 
The travelling mountains of the sky. 
Or let the streams in civil mode 
Direct your choice upon a road ; 

For one and all, or high or low, 
Will lead you where you wish to go ; 
And one and all go night and day 
Over the hills and far away / 

Forest of Montargis, 1878. 



Ill 

THE CANOE SPEAKS 

On the great streams the ships may go 

About men's business too and fro. 

But I, the egg-shell pinnace, sleep 

On crystal waters ankle-deep : 

I, whose diminutive design, 

Of sweeter cedar, pithier pine, 

Is fashioned on so frail a mould, 

A hand may launch, a hand withhold : 

I, rather, with the leaping trout 

Wind, among lilies, in and out ; 

I, the unnamed, inviolate, 

Green, rustic rivers, navigate ; 

My dipping paddle scarcely shakes 



THE CANOE SPEAKS 

The berry in the bramble-brakes ; 
Still forth on my green way I wend 
Beside the cottage garden-end; 
And by the nested angler fare, 
And take the lovers unaware. 
By willow wood and water-wheel 
Speedily fleets my touching keel ; 
By all retired and shady spots 
Where prosper dim forget-me-nots; 
By meadows where at afternoon 
The growing maidens troop in June 
To loose their girdles on the grass. 
Ah ! speedier than before the glass 
The backward toilet goes ; and swift 
As swallows quiver, robe and shift 
And the rough country stockings lie 
Around each young divinity. 
When, following the recondite brook, 
Sudden upon this scene I look, 



UNDERWOODS 

And light with unfamiliar face 
On chaste Diana's bathing-place, 
Loud ring the hills about and all 
The shallows are abandoned. . . 



IV 

It is the season now to go 
About the country high and low, 
Among the lilacs hand in hand, 
And two by two in fairy land. 

The brooding boy, the sighing maid, 
Wholly fain and half afraid, 
Now meet along the hazel'd brook 
To pass and linger, pause and look. 

A year ago, and blithely paired, 
Their rough-and-tumble play they shared ; 
They kissed and quarrelled, laughed and cried, 
A year ago at Eastertide. 



UNDERWOODS 

With bursting heart, with fiery face, 

She strove against him in the race ; 

He unabashed her garter saw, 

That now would touch her skirts with awe. 

Now by the stile ablaze she stops, 
And his demurer eyes he drops ; 
Now they exchange averted sighs 
Or stand and marry silent eyes. 

And he to her a hero is 
And sweeter she than primroses ; 
Their common silence dearer far 
Than nightingale and mavis are. 

Now when they sever wedded hands, 
Joy trembles in their bosom-strands, 
And lovely laughter leaps and falls 
Upon their lips in madrigals. 



V 
THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL 

A naked house, a naked tnoor, 
A shivering pool before the door, 
A garden bare of flowers and fruit 
And poplars at the garden foot : 
Such is the place that I live in, 
Bleak without and bare within. 

Yet shall your ragged moor receive 
The incomparable pomp of eve, 
And the cold glories of the dawn 
Behind your shivering trees be drawn ; 
And when the wind from place to place 



UNDERWOODS 

Doth the unmoored cloud-galleons chase, 
Your garden gloom and gleam again, 
With leaping sun, with glancing rain. 
Here shall the wizard moon ascend 
The heavens, in the crimson end 
Of day's declining splendour ; here 
The army of the stars appear. 
The neighbour hollows dry or wet, 
Spring shall with tender flowers beset ; 
And oft the morning muser see 
Larks rising from the broomy lea, 
And every fairy wheel and thread 
Of cobweb dew-bediamonded. 
When daisies go, shall winter time 
Silver the simple grass with rime ; 
Autumnal frosts enchant the pool 
And make the cart-ruts beautiful ; 
, And when snow-bright the moor expands, 
How shall your children clap their hands ! 



THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL 

To make this earth, our hermitage, 
A cheerful and a changeful page, 
God's bright and intricate device 
Of days and seasons doth suffice. 



VI 
A VISIT FROM THE SEA 

Far from the loud sea beaches 
Where he goes fishing and crying, 

Here in the inland garden 
Why is the sea-gull flying ? 

Here are no fish to dive for ; 

Here is the corn and lea; 
Here are the green trees rustling. 

Hie away home to sea! 

Fresh is the river water 

And quiet among the rushes; 



A VISIT FROM THE SEA 13 

This is no home for the sea-gull 
But for the rooks and thrushes. 

Pity the bird that has wandered ! 

Pity the sailor ashore ! 
Hurry him home to the ocean, 

Let him come here no more ! 

High on the sea-cliff ledges 

The white gulls are trooping and crying, 
Here among rooks and roses, 

Why is the sea-gull flying ? . 



VII 
TO A GARDENER 

Friend, in my mountain-side demesne, 
My plain-beholding, rosy, green 
And linnet-haunted garden-ground, 
Let still the esculents abound. 
Let first the onion flourish there, 
Rose among roots, the maiden-fair, 
Wine-scented and poetic soul 
Of the capacious salad bowl. 
Let thyme the mountaineer (to dress 
The tinier birds) and wading cress, 
The lover of the shallow brook, 
From all my plots and borders look. 



TO A GARDENER 15 

Nor crisp and ruddy radish, nor 
Pease-cods for the child's pinafore 
Be lacking; nor of salad clan 
The last and least that ever ran 
About great nature's garden-beds. 
Nor thence be missed the speary heads 
Of artichoke; nor thence the bean 
That gathered innocent and green 
Outsavours the belauded pea. 

These tend, I prithee ; and for me, 
Thy most long-suffering master, bring 
In April, when the linnets sing 
And the days lengthen more and more, 
At sundown to the garden door. 
And I, being provided thus, 
Shall, with superb asparagus, 
A book, a taper, and a cup 
Of country wine, divinely sup. 
Za Solitude, Hyeres. 



VIII 
TO MINNIE 

(With a hand-glass) 
A PICTURE-FRAME for yOU tO fill, 

A paltry setting for your face, 
A thing that has no worth until 

You lend it something of your grace, 

I send (unhappy I that sing 

Laid by awhile upon the shelf) 

Because I would not send a thing 

Less charming than you are yourself. 

And happier than I, alas ! 

(Dumb thing, I envy its delight) 
'Twill wish you well, the looking-glass, 

And look you in the face to-night. 



IX 

TO K. de M. 

A lover of the moorland bare 

And honest country winds, you were ; 

The silver-skimming rain you took ; 

And loved the lioodings of the brook, 

Dew, frost and mountains, fire and seas, 

Tumultuary silences, 

Winds that in darkness fifed a tune, 

And the high-riding, virgin moon. 

And as the berry, pale and sharp, 
Springs on some ditch's counterscarp 
In our ungenial, native north — 
You put your frosted wildings forth, 



i8 UNDERWOODS 

And on the heath, afar from man, 
A strong and bitter virgin ran. 

The berry ripened keeps the rude 
And racy flavour of the wood. 
And you that loved the empty plain 
All redolent of wind and rain, 
Around you still the curlew sings — 
The freshness of the weather clings — 
The maiden jewels of the rain 
Sit in your dabbled locks again. 



X 

TO N. V. de G. S. 

The unfathomable sea, and time, and tears, 
The deeds of heroes and the crimes of kings 
Dispart us ; and the river of events 
Has, for an age of years, to east and west 
More widely borne our cradles. Thou to me 
Art foreign, as when seamen at the dawn 
Descry a land far off and know not which. 
So I approach uncertain ; so I cruise 
Round thy mysterious islet, and behold 
Surf and great mountains and loud river-bars, 
And from the shore hear inland voices call. 



UNDERWOODS 

Strange is the seaman's heart ; he hopes, he fears ; 
Draws closer and sweeps wider from that coast; 
Lalt, his rent sail refits, and to the deep 
His shattered prow uncomforted puts back. 
Yet as he goes he ponders at the helm 
Of that bright island ; where he feared to touch, 
His spirit readventures ; and for years, 
Where by his wife he slumbers safe at home, 
Thoughts of that land revisit him ; he sees 
The eternal mountains beckon, and awakes 
Yearning for that far home that might have been. 



XI 

TO WILL. H. LOW 

Youth now flees on feathered foot, 
Faint and fainter sounds the flute, 
Rarer songs of gods ; and still 
Somewhere on the sunny hill, 
Or along the winding stream, 
Through the willows, flits a dream ; 
Flits but shows a smiling face, 
Flees but with so quaint a grace, 
None can choose to stay at home, 
All must follow, all must roam. 



UNDERWOODS 

This is unborn beauty : she 
Now in air floats high and free, 
Takes the sun and breaks the blue ; - 
Late with stooping pinion flew 
Raking hedgerow trees, and wet 
Her wing in silver streams, and set 
Shining foot on temple roof: 
Now again she flies aloof, 
Coasting mountain clouds and kiss't 
By the evening's amethyst. 



In wet wood and miry lane, 
Still we pant and pound in vain ; 
Still with leaden foot we chase 
Waning pinion, fainting face; 
Still with gray hair we stumble on, 
Till, behold, the vision gone ! 



TO WILL. H. LOW 

Where hath fleeting beauty led ? 
To the doorway of the dead. 
Life is over, life was gay : 
We have come the primrose way. 



23 



XII 
TO MRS. WILL. H. LOW 

Even in the bluest noonday of July, 

There could not run the smallest breath of wind 

But all the quarter sounded like a wood; 

And in the chequered silence and above 

The hum of city cabs that sought the Bois, 

Suburban ashes shivered into song. 

A patter and a chatter and a chirp 

And a long dying hiss — it was as though 

Starched old brocaded dames through all the house 

Had trailed a strident skirt, or the whole sky 

Even in a wink had over-brimmed in rain. 



TO MRS. WILL. H. LOW 25 

Hark, in these shady parlours, how it talks 

Of the near Autumn, how the smitten ash 

Trembles and augurs floods ! O not too long 

In these inconstant latitudes delay, 

O not too late from the unbeloved north 

Trim your escape ! For soon shall this low roof 

Resound indeed with rain, soon shall your eyes 

Search the foul garden, search the darkened rooms, 

Nor find one jewel but the blazing log. 

12 Rue Vernier, Paris. 



XIII 
TO H. F. BROWN 

(Written during a dangerous sickness.) 

I sit and wait a pair of oars 
On cis-Elysian river-shores. 
Where the immortal dead have sate, 
'Tis mine to sit and meditate ; 
To re-ascend life's rivulet, 
Without remorse, without regret ; 
And sing my Alma Genetrix 
Among the willows of the Styx. 

And lo, as my serener soul 

Did these unhappy shores patrol, 



TO H. F. BROWN 27 

And wait with an attentive ear 
The coming of the gondolier, 
Your fire-surviving roll I took, 
Your spirited and happy book ; ' 
Whereon, despite my frowning fate, 
It did my soul so recreate 
That all my fancies fled away 
On a Venetian holiday. 

Now, thanks to your triumphant care, 

Your pages clear as April air, 

The sails, the bells, the birds, I know, 

And the far-off Friulan snow ; 

The land and sea, the sun and shade, 

And the blue even lamp-inlaid. 

For this, for these, for all, O friend, 

For your whole book from end to end — 

1 Life on the Lagoons, by H. F. Brown, originally burned in the fire 
at Messrs. Kegan Paul, Trench, and Co.'s. 



28 UNDERWOODS 

For Paron Piero's muttonham — 
I your defaulting debtor am. 

Perchance, reviving, yet may I 
To your sea-paven city hie, 
And in a./elze, some day yet 
Light at your pipe my cigarette. 



XIV 
TO ANDREW LANG 

Dear Andrew, with the brindled hair, 
Who glory to have thrown in air, 
High over arm, the trembling reed, 
By Ale and Kail, by Till and Tweed : 
An equal craft of hand you show 
The pen to guide, the fly to throw : 
I count you happy starred ; for God, 
When He with inkpot and with rod 
Endowed you, bade your fortune lead 
Forever by the crooks of Tweed, 
Forever by the woods of song 
And lands that to the Muse belong ; 
Or if in peopled streets, or in 
The abhorred pedantic sanhedrim, 



30 UNDERWOODS 

It should be yours to wander, still 

Airs of the morn, airs of the hill, 

The plovery Forest and the seas 

That break about the Hebrides, 

Should follow over field and plain 

And find you at the window pane ; 

And you again see hill and peel, 

And the bright springs gush at your heel. 

So went the fiat forth, and so 

Garrulous like a brook you go, 

With sound of happy mirth and sheen 

Of daylight — whether by the green 

You fare that moment, or the gray ; 

Whether you dwell in March or May ; 

Or whether treat of reels and rods 

Or of the old unhappy gods : 

Still like a brook your page has shone, 

And your ink sings of Helicon. 



XV 
ET TU IN ARCADIA VIXISTI 

(TO R. A. M. S.) 

In ancient tales, O friend, thy spirit dwelt ; 

There, from of old, thy childhood passed ; and there 

High expectation, high delights and deeds, 

Thy fluttering heart with hope and terror moved. 

And thou hast heard of yore the Blatant Beast, 

And Roland's horn, and that war-scattering shout 

Of all-unarmed Achilles, aegis-crowned. 

And perilous lands thou sawest, sounding shores 

And seas and forests drear, island and dale 

And mountain dark. For thou with Tristram rod'st 

Or Bedevere, in farthest Lyonesse. 



32 UNDERWOODS 

Thou hadst a booth in Samarcand, whereat 

Side-looking Magians trafficked ; thence, by night, 

An Afreet snatched thee, and with wings upbore 

Beyond the Aral mount; or, hoping gain, 

Thou, with a jar of money, didst embark, 

For Balsorah, by sea. But chiefly thou 

In that clear air took'st life ; in Arcady 

The haunted, land of song; and by the wells 

Where most the gods frequent. There Chiron old, 

In the Pelethronian antre, taught thee lore 

The plants, he taught, and by the shining stars 

In forests dim to steer. There hast thou seen 

Immortal Pan dance secret in a glade, 

And, dancing, roll his eyes; these, where they fell, 

Shed glee, and through the congregated oaks 

A flying horror winged ; while all the earth 

To the god's pregnant footing thrilled within. 

Or whiles, beside the sobbing stream, he breathed, 

In his clutched pipe, unformed and wizard strains, 



ET TU IN ARCADIA VIXISTI 33 

Divine yet brutal ; which the forest heard, 
And thou, with awe ; and far upon the plain 
The unthinking ploughman started and gave ear. 

Now things there are that, upon him who sees, 
A strong vocation lay ; and strains there are 
That whoso hears shall hear for evermore. 
For evermore thou hear'st immortal Pan 
And those melodious godheads, ever young 
And ever quiring, on the mountains old. 

What was this earth, child of the gods, to thee ? 

Forth from thy dreamland thou, a dreamer, cam'st, 

And in thine ears the olden music rang, 

And in thy mind the doings of the dead, 

And those heroic ages long forgot. 

To a so fallen earth, alas ! too late, 

Alas ! in evil days, thy steps return, 

To list at noon for nightingales, to grow 



34 UNDERWOODS 

A dweller on the beach till Argo come 
That came long since, a lingerer by the pool 
Where that desired angel bathes no more. 

As when the Indian to Dakota comes, 
Or farthest Idaho, and where he dwelt, 
He with his clan, a humming city finds ; 
Thereon awhile, amazed, he stares, and then 
To right and leftward, like a questing dog, 
Seeks first the ancestral altars, then the hearth 
Long cold with rains, and where old terror lodged, 
And where the dead. So thee undying Hope, 
With all her pack, hunts screaming through the years 
Here, there, thou fleeest ; but nor here nor there 
The pleasant gods abide, the glory dwells. 

That, that was not Apollo, not the god. 

This was not Venus, though she Venus seemed 

A moment. And though fair yon river move, 



ET TU IN ARCADIA VIXISTI 35 

She, all the way, from disenchanted fount 

To seas unhallowed runs; the gods forsook 

Long since her trembling rushes ; from her plains 

Disconsolate, long since adventure fled; 

And now although the inviting river flows, 

And every poplared cape, and every bend 

Or willowy islet, win upon thy soul 

And to thy hopeful shallop whisper speed ; 

Yet hope not thou at all; hope is no more; 

And O, long since the golden groves are dead, 

The faery cities vanished from the land ! 



XVI 
TO W. E. HENLEY 

The year runs through her phases; rain and sun, 
Springtime and summer pass ; winter succeeds ; 
But one pale season rules the house of death. 
Cold falls the imprisoned daylight ; fell disease 
By each lean pallet squats, and pain and sleep 
Toss gaping on the pillows. 

But O thou ! 
Uprise and take thy pipe. Bid music flow, 
Strains by good thoughts attended, like the spring 
The swallows follow over land and sea. 
Pain sleeps at once ; at once, with open eyes, 
Dozing despair awakes. The shepherd sees 



TO W. E. HENLEY 37 

His flock come bleating home ; the seaman hears 
Once more the cordage rattle. Airs of home ! 
Youth, love and roses blossom ; the gaunt ward 
Dislimns and disappears, and, opening out, 
Shows brooks and forests, and the blue beyond 
Of mountains. 

Small the pipe ; but O ! do thou, 
Peak-faced and suffering piper, blow therein 
The dirge of heroes dead; and to these sick, 
These dying, sound the triumph over death. 
Behold ! each greatly breathes ; each tastes a joy 
Unknown before, in dying ; for each knows 
A hero dies with him — though unfulfilled, 
Yet conquering truly — and not dies in vain. 

So is pain cheered, death comforted ; the house 
Of sorrow smiles to listen. Once again — 
O thou, Orpheus and Heracles, the bard 
And the deliverer, touch the stops again ! 



XVII 
HENRY JAMES 

Who comes to-night ? We ope the doors in vain. 

Who comes ? My bursting walls, can you contain 

The presences that now together throng 

Your narrow entry, as with flowers and song, 

As with the air of life, the breath of talk ? 

Lo, how these fair immaculate women walk 

Behind their jocund maker; and we see 

Slighted De Mauves, and that far different she, 

Gressie, the trivial sphynx ; and to our feast 

Daisy and Barb and Chancellor (she not least ! ) 

With all their silken, all their airy kin, 

Do like unbidden angels enter in. 

But he, attended by these shining names, 

Comes (best of all) himself — our welcome James. 



XVIII 
THE MIRROR SPEAKS 

Where the bells peal far at sea 

Cunning fingers fashioned me. 

There on palace walls I hung 

While that Consuelo sung ; 

But I heard, though I listened well, 

Never a note, never a trill, 

Never a beat of the chiming bell. 

There I hung and looked, and there 

In my gray face, faces fair 

Shone from under shining hair. 

Well I saw the poising head, 

But the lips moved and nothing said ; 



4© UNDERWOODS 

And when lights were in the hall, 
Silent moved the dancers all. 

So awhile I glowed, and then 
Fell on dusty days and men ; 
Long I slumbered packed in straw, 
Long I none but dealers saw ; 
Till before my silent eye 
One that sees came passing by. 

Now with an outlandish grace, 
To the sparkling fire I face 
In the blue room at Skerry vore ; 
Where I wait until the door 
Open, and the Prince of Men, 
Henry James, shall come again. 



XIX 
KATHARINE 

We see you as we see a face 
That trembles in a forest place 
Upon the mirrror of a pool 
Forever quiet, clear and cool ; 
And in the wayward glass, appears 
To hover between smiles and tears, 
Elfin and human, airy and true, 
And backed by the reflected blue. 



XX 

TO F. J. S. 

I read, dear friend, in your dear face 
Your life's tale told with perfect grace ; 
The river of your life, I trace 
Up the sun-chequered, devious bed 
To the far-distant fountain-head. 

Not one quick beat of your warm heart, 
Nor thought that came to you apart, 
Pleasure nor pity, love nor pain 
Nor sorrow, has gone by in vain ; 

But as some lone, wood-wandering child 
Brings home with him at evening mild 
The thorns and flowers of all the wild, 
From your whole life, O fair and true 
Your flowers and thorns you bring with you ! 



XXI 
REQUIEM 

Under the wide and starry sky, 
Dig the grave and let me lie. 
Glad did I live and gladly die, 
And I laid me down with a will. 

This be the verse you grave for me : 
Here he lies where he lo?iged to be ; 
Home is the sailor, home from sea, 
And the hunter home from the hill. 



XXII 
THE CELESTIAL SURGEON 

If I have faltered more or less 
In my great task of happiness ; 
If I have moved among my race 
And shown no glorious morning face; 
If beams from happy human eyes 
Have moved me not ; if morning skies, 
Books, and my food, and summer rain 
Knocked on my sullen heart in vain : — 
Lord, thy most pointed pleasure take 
And stab my spirit broad awake ; 
Or, Lord, if too obdurate I, 
Choose thou, before that spirit die, 
A piercing pain, a killing sin, 
And to my dead heart run them in ! 



XXIII 
OUR LADY OF THE SNOWS 

Out of the sun, out of the blast, 
Out of the world, alone I passed 
Across the moor and through the wood 
To where the monastery stood. 
There neither lute nor breathing fife, 
Nor rumour of the world of life, 
Nor confidences low and dear, 
Shall strike the meditative ear. 
Aloof, unhelpful, and unkind, 
The prisoners of the iron mind, 
Where nothing speaks except the hell 
The unfraternal brothers dwell. 



4 6 UNDERWOODS 

Poor passionate men, still clothed afresh 

With agonising folds of flesh ; 

Whom the clear eyes solicit still 

To some bold output of the will, 

While fairy Fancy far before 

And musing Memory-Hold-the-door 

Now to heroic death invite 

And now uncurtain fresh delight : 

O, little boots it thus to dwell 

On the remote unneighboured hill ! 

O to be up and doing, O 
Unfearing and unshamed to go 
In all the uproar and the press 
About my human business ! 
My undissuaded heart I hear 
Whisper courage in my ear. 
With voiceless calls, the ancient earth 
Summons me to a daily birth. 



OUR LADY OF THE SNOWS 47 

Thou, O my love, ye, O my friends — 
The gist oflife, the end of ends — 
To laugh, to love, to live, to die, 
Ye call me by the ear and eye ! 

Forth from the casemate, on the plain 
Where honour has the world to gain, 
Pour forth and bravely do your part, 
O knights of the unshielded heart! 
Forth and forever forward ! — out 
From prudent turret and redoubt, 
And in the mellay charge amain, 
To fall but yet to rise again ! 
Captive ? ah, still, to honour bright, 
A captive soldier of the right ! 
Or free and fighting, good with ill ? 
Unconquering but unconquered still ! 

And ye, O brethren, what if God, 
When from Heav'n's top he spies abroad, 



4 8 UNDERWOODS 

And sees on this tormented stage 
The noble war of mankind rage : 
What if his vivifying eye, 
O monks, should pass your corner by ? 
For still the Lord is Lord of might; 
In deeds, in deeds, he takes delight; 
The plough, the spear, the laden barks, 
The field, the founded city, marks ; 
He marks the smiler of the streets, 
The singer upon garden seats ; 
He sees the climber in the rocks ; 
To him, the shepherd folds his flocks. 
For those he loves that underprop 
With daily virtues Heaven's top, 
And bear the falling sky with ease, 
Unfrowning caryatides. 
Those he approves that ply the trade, 
That rock the child, that wed the maid, 
That with weak virtues, weaker hands, 



OUR LADY OF THE SNOWS 

Sow gladness on the peopled lands, 
And still with laughter, song and shout, 
Spin the great wheel of earth about. 

But ye ? — O ye who linger still 
Here in your fortress on the hill, 
With placid face, with tranquil breath, 
The unsought volunteers of death, 
Our cheerful General on high 
With careless looks may pass you by. 



49 



XXIV 

Not yet, my soul, these friendly fields desert, 
Where thou with grass, and rivers, and the breeze, 
And the bright face of day, thy dalliance hadst ; 
Where to thine ear first sang the enraptured birds; 
Where love and thou that lasting bargain made. 
The ship rides trimmed, and from the eternal shore 
Thou hearest airy voices ; but not yet 
Depart, my soul, not yet awhile depart. 

Freedom is far, rest far. Thou art with life 
Too closely woven, nerve with nerve intwined ; 
Service still craving service, love for love, 
Love for dear love, still suppliant with tears. 



NOT YET, MY SOUL 51 

Alas, not yet thy human task is done ! 

A bond at birth is forged ; a debt doth lie 

Immortal on mortality. It grows — 

By vast rebound it grows, unceasing growth ; 

Gift upon gift, alms upon alms, upreared, 

From man, from God, from nature, till the soul 

At that so huge indulgence stands amazed. 

Leave not, my soul, the unfoughten field, nor leave 
Thy debts dishonoured, nor thy place desert 
Without due service rendered. For thy life, 
Up, spirit, and defend that fort of clay, 
Thy body, now beleaguered; whether soon 
Or late she fall; whether to-day thy friends 
Bewail thee dead, or, after years, a man 
Grown old in honour and the friend of peace. 
Contend, my soul, for moments and for hours ; 
Each is with service pregnant ; each reclaimed 
Is as a kingdom conquered, where to reign. 



52 UNDERWOODS 

As when a captain rallies to the fight 

His scattered legions, and beats ruin back, 

He, on the field, encamps, well pleased in mind. 

Yet surely him shall fortune overtake, 

Him smite in turn, headlong his ensigns drive ; 

And that dear land, now safe, to-morrow fall. 

But he, unthinking, in the present good 

Solely delights, and all the camps rejoice. 



XXV 

It is not yours, O mother, to complain, 

Not, mother, yours to weep, 

Though nevermore your son again 

Shall to your bosom creep, 

Though nevermore again you watch your baby sleep. 

Though in the greener paths of earth, 

Mother and child, no more 

We wander ; and no more the birth 

Of me whom once you bore, 

Seems still the brave reward that once it seemed of yore ; 

Though as all passes, day and night, 
The seasons and the years, 
From you, O mother, this delight, 



54 UNDERWOODS 

This also disappears — 

Some profit yet survives of all your pangs and tears. 

The child, the seed, the grain of corn, 

The acorn on the hill, 

Each for some separate end is born 

In season fit, and still 

Each must in strength arise to work the almighty will 

So from the hearth the children flee, 

By that almighty hand 

Austerely led ; so one by sea 

Goes forth, and one by land ; 

Nor aught of all man's sons escapes from that command. 

So from the sally each obeys 

The unseen almighty nod ; 

So till the ending all their ways 

Blindfolded loth have trod : 

Nor knew their task at all, but were the tools of God. 



IT IS NOT YOURS 55 

And as the fervent smith of yore 

Beat out the glowing blade, 

Nor wielded in the front of war 

The weapons that he made, 

But in the tower at home still plied his ringing trade ; 

So like a sword the son shall roam 

On nobler missions sent; 

And as the smith remained at home 

In peaceful turret pent, 

So sits the while at home the mother well content. 



XXVI 
THE SICK CHILD 

Child. O mother, lay your hand on my brow ! 
O mother, mother, where am I now ? 
Why is the room so gaunt and great ? 
Why am I lying awake so late ? 

Mother. Fear not at all : the night is still. 

Nothing is here that means you ill — 
Nothing but lamps the whole town through, 
And never a child awake but you. 

Child. Mother, mother, speak low in my ear, 

Some of the things are so great and near, 



THE SICK CHILD 57 

Some are so small and far away, 
I have a fear that I cannot say. 
What have I done, and what do I fear, 
And why are you crying, mother dear ? 

Mother. Out in the city, sounds begin 

Thank the kind God, the carts come in ! 
An hour or two more and God is so kind, 
The day shall be blue in the window-blind, 
Then shall my child go sweetly asleep, 
And dream of the birds and the hills of sheep. 



XXVII 
IN MEMORIAM F. A. S. 

Yet, O stricken heart, remember, O remember 
How of human days he lived the better part. 

April came to bloom and never dim December 
Breathed its killing chills upon the head or heart. 

Doomed to know not Winter, only Spring, a being 
Trod the flowery April blithely for a while, 

Took his fill of music, joy of thought and seeing, 
Came and stayed and went, nor ever ceased to smile. 

Came and stayed and went, and now when all is finished, 
You alone have crossed the melancholy stream, 

Yours the pang, but his, O his, the undiminished 
Undecaying gladness, undeparted dream. 



IN MEMORIAM F. A. S. 59 

All that life contains of torture, toil, and treason, 
Shame, dishonour, death, to him were but a name. 

Here, a boy, he dwelt through all the singing season 
And ere the day of sorrow departed as he came. 



Davos, 1881. 



XXVIII 
TO MY FATHER 

Peace and her huge invasion to these shores 
Puts daily home ; innumerable sails 
Dawn on the far horizon and draw near; 
Innumerable loves, uncounted hopes 
To our wild coasts, not darkling now, approach : 
Not now obscure, since thou and thine are there, 
And bright on the lone isle, the foundered reef, 
The long, resounding foreland, Pharos stands. 

These are thy works, O father, these thy crown ; 
Whether on high the air be pure, they shine 
Along the yellowing sunset, and all night 
Among the unnumbered stars of God they shine; 



TO MY FATHER 61 

Or whether fogs arise and far and wide 
The low sea-level drown — each finds a tongue 
And all night long the tolling bell resounds : 
So shine, so toll, till night be overpast, 
Till the stars vanish, till the sun return, 
And in the haven rides the fleet secure. 

In the first hour, the seaman in his skiff 

Moves through the unmoving bay, to where the town 

Its earliest smoke into the air upbreathes 

And the rough hazels climb along the beach. 

To the tugg'd oar the distant echo speaks. 

The ship lies resting, where by reef and roost 

Thou and thy lights have led her like a child. 

This hast thou done, and I — can I be base ? 

I must arise, O father, and to port 

Some lost, complaining seaman pilot home. 



XXIX 

IN THE STATES 

With half a heart I wander here 

As from an age gone by 
A brother — yet though young in years, 

An elder brother, I. 

You speak another tongue than mine, 
Though both were English born. 

I towards the night of time decline, 
You mount into the morn. 

Youth shall grow great and strong and free, 

But age must still decay : 
To-morrow for the States — for me, 

England and Yesterday. 



San Francisco. 



XXX 

A PORTRAIT 

I am a kind of farthing dip, 

Unfriendly to the nose and eyes ; 

A blue-behinded ape, I skip 
Upon the trees of Paradise. 

At mankind's feast, I take my place 
In solemn, sanctimonious state, 

And have the air of saying grace 
While I defile the dinner plate. 

I am " the smiler with the knife," 
The battener upon garbage, I — 



64 UNDERWOODS 

Dear Heaven, with such a rancid life, 
Were it not better far to die ? 

Yet still, about the human pale, 
I love to scamper, love to race, 

To swing by my irreverent tail 
All over the most holy place ; 

And when at length, some golden day, 
The unfailing sportsman, aiming at, 

Shall bag, me — all the world shall say : 
Thank God, and there's an end of that / 



XXXI 

Sing clearlier, Muse, or evermore be still, 
Sing truer or no longer sing ! 
No more the voice of melancholy Jacques 
To wake a weeping echo in the hill ; 
But as the boy, the pirate of the spring, 
From the green elm a living linnet takes, 
One natural verse recapture — then be still. 



XXXII 
A CAMP 1 

The bed was made, the room was fit, 
By punctual eve the stars were lit ; 
The air was still, the water ran, 
No need was there for maid or man, 
When we put up, my ass and I, 
At God's green caravanserai. 

1 From Travels with a Donkey. 



XXXIII 
THE COUNTRY OF THE CAMISARDS 1 

We travelled in the print of olden wars, 
Yet all the land was green, 
And love we found, and peace, 
Where fire and war had been. 

They pass and smile, the children of the sword • 
No more the sword they wield ; 
And O, how deep the corn 
Along the battlefield ! 

1 From Travels with a Donkey. 



XXXIV 
SKERRYVORE 

For love of lovely words, and for the sake 
Of those, my kinsmen and my countrymen, 
Who early and late in the windy ocean toiled 
To plant a star for seamen, where was then 
The surfy haunt of seals and cormorants : 
I, on the lintel of this cot, inscribe 
The name of a strong tower. 



XXXV 
SKERRYVORE : The Parallel 

Here all is sunny, and when the truant gull 

Skims the green level of the lawn, his wing 

Dispetals roses; here the house is framed 

Of kneaded brick and the plumed mountain pine, 

Such clay as artists fashion and such wood 

As the tree-climbing urchin breaks. But there 

Eternal granite hewn from the living isle 

And dowelled with brute iron, rears a tower 

That from its wet foundation to its crown 

Of glittering glass, stands, in the sweep of winds, 

Immovable, immortal, eminent. 



XXXVI 

My house, I say. But hark to the sunny doves 
That make my roof the arena of their loves, 
That gyre about the gable all day long 
And fill the chimneys with their murmurous song : 
Our house, they say; and mine, the cat declares 
And spreads his golden fleece upon the chairs ; 
And mine the dog, and rises stiff with wrath 
If any alien foot profane the path. 
So, too, the buck that trimmed my terraces, 
Our whilome gardener, called the garden his ; 
Who now, deposed, surveys my plain abode 
And his late kingdom, only from the road. 



XXXVII 

My body which my dungeon is, 
And yet my parks and palaces : — 

Which is so great that there I go 
All the day long to and fro, 
And when the night begins to fall 
Throw down my bed and sleep, while all 
The building hums with wakefulness — 
Even as a child of savages 
When evening takes her on her way, 
(She having roamed a summer's day 
Along the mountain-sides and scalp) 
Sleeps in an antre of that alp : — 

Which is so broad and high that there, 
As in the topless fields of air, 
My fancy soars like to a kite 



72 UNDERWOODS 

And faints in the blue infinite : — 

Which is so strong, my strongest throes 
And the rough world's besieging blows 
Not break it, and so weak withal, 
Death ebbs and flows in its loose wall 
As the green sea in fishers' nets, 
And tops its topmost parapets : — 
Which is so wholly mine that I 
Can wield its whole artillery, 
And mine so little, that my soul 
Dwells in perpetual control, 
And I but think and speak and do 
As my dead fathers move me to : — 

If this born body of my bones 
The beggared soul so barely owns, 
What money passed from hand to hand, 
What creeping custom of the land, 
What deed of author or assign, 
Can make a house a thing of mine ? 



XXXVIII 

Say not of me that weakly I declined 
The labours of my sires, and fled the sea, 
The towers we founded and the lamps we lit, 
To play at home with paper like a child. 
But rather say: In the afternoon of time 
A strenuous family dusted from its ha fids 
The sand of granite, and beholding far 
Along the sounding coast its pyramids 
And tall memorials catch the dying sun, 
Smiled well content, and to this childish task 
Around the fire addressed its evening hours. 



BOOK II.— In Scots 



TABLE OF COMMON SCOTTISH VOWEL 
SOUNDS 

= open A as in rare. 

= AW as in law. 

open E as in mere, but this with exceptions, as 
heather = heather, wean = wain, lear =lair. 

ee ^ 

ei > = open E as in mere. 

ie ) 

oa = open O as in more. 

ou = doubled O as in poor. 

ow = OW as in bower. 

u = doubled O as in poor. 

ui or ii before R = (say roughly) open A as in rare. 

ui or ii before any other consonant = (say roughly) close I 
as in grin. 

y = open I as in kite. 

i = pretty nearly what you please, much as in English. 
Heaven guide the reader through that labyrinth ! But 
in Scots it dodges usually from the short I, as in grin, 
to the open E, as in mere. Find and blind, I may 
remark, are pronounced to rhyme with the preterite 
of grin. 



THE MAKER TO POSTERITY 

Far 'yont amang the years to be 
When a' we think, an' a' we see, 
An' a' we luve, 's been dung ajee 

By time's rouch shouther, 
An' what was richt and wrang for me 

Lies mangled throu'ther, 

It's possible — it's hardly mair — 
That some ane, ripin' after lear — 

Some auld professor or young heir, 

If still there's either — 

May find an' read me, an' be sair 

Perplexed, puir brither ! 



78 UNDERWOODS 

" What tongue does your auld bookie speak ? " 

He'll spier; an' I, his mou to steik: 
" JVo bein' fit to write in Greek, 
I tvrote in Lallan, 
Dear to my heart as the peat reek, 
Auld as Tantallon. 

" Few spak it than, an' noo there's na?ie. 
My puir auld sangs lie a' their lane, 
Their sense, that aince was braw an' plain, 
Tint a'thegether, 
• Like runes upon a stand in 1 stane 
Ai/iang the heather. 

" But think not you the brae to speel; 
You, tae, maun chow the bitter peel y 
Tor a' your tear, for a' your skeel, 

Ye're nane sae lucky y 
An' things are mebbe waur than weel 
For you, my buckie. 



THE MAKER TO POSTERITY 79 

" The hale concern ( baith hens an 1 eggs, 
Baith books art -writers, stars an 1 clegs) 
Noo stackers upon lowse?it legs 

Art wears awd 1 ; 
The tack d mankind, near the dregs, 

J?ins unco law. 

" Your book, that in some braw new tongue, 
Ye wrote or pre n tit, preached or sung, 
Will still be just a bairn, an 1 young 

In fame an' years, 
Whan the hale planet's guts are dung 
About your ears; 

"Art you, sair gruppi?? to a spar 
Or whammled wi' some bleezirt star, 
Cryirt to ken whaur deilye are, 

Hame, France, or Flanders — 
Whang sindry like a railway car 
Art flie in danders^ 



II 

ILLE TERRARUM 

Frae nirly, nippin', Eas'lan' breeze, 
Frae Norlan' snaw, an' haar o' seas, 
Weel happit in your gairden trees, 

A bonny bit, 
Atween the muckle Pentland's knees, 

Secure ye sit. 

Beeches an' aiks entwine their theek, 
An' firs, a stench, auld-farrant clique. 
A' simmer day, your chimleys reek, 

Couthy and bien ; 
An' here an' there your windies keek 

Amang the green. 



ILLE TERRARUM 81 

A pickle plats an' paths an' posies, 
A wheen auld gillyflowers an' roses : 
A ring o' wa's the hale encloses 

Frae sheep or men ; 
An' there the auld housie beeks an' doses, 

A' by her lane. 

The gairdner crooks his weary back 

A' day in the pitaty-track, 

Or mebbe stops awhile to crack 

Wi' Jane the cook, 
Or at some buss, worm-eaten-black, 

To gie a look. 

Frae the high hills the curlew ca's ; 
The sheep gang baaing by the wa's ; 
Or whiles a clan o' roosty craws 

Cangle thegether; 
The wild bees seek the gairden raws, 

Weariet wi' heather. 



82 UNDERWOODS 

Or in the gloamin' douce an' gray 
The sweet-throat mavis tunes her lay ; 
The herd comes linkin' doun the brae ; 

An' by degrees 
The muckle siller mline maks way 

Amang the trees. 

Here aft hae I, wi' sober heart, 
For meditation sat apairt, 
When orra loves or kittle art 

Perplexed my mind ; 
Here socht a balm for ilka smart 

O' humankind. 

Here aft, weel neukit by my lane, 
Wi' Horace, or perhaps Montaigne, 
The mornin' hours hae come an' gane 

Abune my heid — 
I wadnae gi'en a chucky-stane 

For a' I'd read. 



ILLE TERRARUM 83 

But noo the auld city, street by street, 
An' winter fu' o' snavv an' sleet, 
Awhile shut in my gangrel feet 

An' goavin' mettle; 
Noo is the soopit ingle sweet, 

An' liltin' kettle. 

An' noo the winter winds complain ; 
Cauld lies the glaur in ilka lane; 
On draigled hizzie, tautit wean 

An' drucken lads, 
In the mirk nicht, the winter rain 

Dribbles an' blads. 

Whan bugles frae the Castle rock, 
An' beaten drums wi' dowie shock, 
Wauken, at cauld-rife sax o'clock, 

My chitterin' frame, 
I mind me on the kintry cock, 

The kintry hame. 



84 UNDERWOODS 

I mind me on yon bonny bield ; 
An' Fancy traivels far afield 
To gaither a' that gairdens yield 

O' sun an' Simmer : 
To hearten up a dowie chield, 

Fancy's the limmer ! 



Ill 

When aince Aprile has fairly come, 
An' birds may bigg in winter's lum, 
An' pleisure's spreid for a' and some 

O' whatna state, 
Love, wi' her auld recruitin' drum, 

Than taks the gate 

The heart plays dunt wi' main an' micht ; 
The lasses' een are a' sae bricht, 
Their dresses are sae braw an' ticht, 

The bonny birdies ! — 
Puir winter virtue at the sicht 

Gangs heels ower hurdies. 



86 UNDERWOODS 

An' aye as love frae land to land 
Tirls the drum wi' eident hand, 
A' men collect at her command, 

Toun-bred or land'art, 
An' follow in a denty band 

Her gaucy standart. 

An' I, wha sang o' rain an' snaw, 
An' weary winter weel awa', 
Noo busk me in a jacket braw, 

An' tak my place 
I' the ram-stam, harum-scarum raw, 

Wi' smilin' face. 



IV 
A MILE AN' A BITTOCK 

A mile an' a bittock, a mile or twa, 
Abiine the burn, ayont the law, 
Davie an' Donal' an' Cherlie an' a', 
An' the miine was shinin' clearly ! 

Ane went hame wi' the ither, an' then 
The ither went hame wi' the ither twa men, 
An' baith wad return him the service again, 
An' the miine was shinin' clearly ! 

The clocks were chappin' in house an' ha', 
Eleeven, twal an' ane an' twa ; 



88 UNDERWOODS 

An' the guidman's face was turnt to the wa', 
An' the niiine was shinin' clearly ! 

A wind got up frae affa the sea, 
It blew the stars as dear's could be, 
It blew in the een of a' o' the three, 
An' the miine was shinin' clearly ! 

Noo, Davie was first to get sleep in his head, 
" The best o' frien's maun twine," he said; 
" I'm weariet, an' here I'm awa' to my bed." 
An' the miine was shinin' clearly ! 

Twa o' them walkin' an' crackin' their lane, 
The mornin' licht cam gray an' plain, 
An' the birds they yammert on stick an' stane, 
An' the miine was shinin' clearly ! 

O years ayont, O years awa', 
My lads, ye'll mind whate'er befa' — 
My lads, ye'll mind on the bield o' the law, 
When the miine was shinin' clearly. 



V 
A LOWDEN SABBATH MORN 

The clinkum-clank o' Sabbath bells 
Noo to the hoastin' rookery swells, 
Noo faintin' laigh in shady dells, 

Sounds far an' near, 
An' through the simmer kintry tells 

Its tale o' cheer. 

An' noo, to that melodious play, 
A' deidly awn the quiet sway — 
A' ken their solemn holiday, 

Bestial an' human, 
The singin' Untie on the brae, 

The restin' plou'man. 



90 UNDERWOODS 

He, mair than a' the lave o' men, 
His week completit joys to ken ; 
Half-dressed, he daunders out an' in, 

Perplext wi' leisure ; 
An' his raxt limbs he'll rax again 

Wi' painfii' pleesure. 

The steerin' mither Strang afit 
Noo shoos the bairnies but a bit ; 
Noo cries them ben, their Sinday shiiit 

To scart upon them, 
Or sweeties in their pouch to pit, 

Wi' blessin's on them. 

The lasses, clean frae tap to taes, 
Are busked in crunklin' underclaes ; 
The gartened hose, the weel-filled stays, 

The nakit shift, 
A' bleached on bonny greens for days, 

An' white's the drift. 



A LOWDEN SABBATH MORN 91 

An' noo to face the kirkvvard mile : 
The guidman's hat o' dacent style, 
The blackit shoon, we noo maun fyle 

As white's the miller : 
A waefii' peety tae, to spile 

The warth o' siller. 

Our Marg'et, aye sae keen to crack, 
Douce-stappin' in the stoury track, 
Her emeralt goun a' kiltit back 

Frae snawy coats, 
White-ankled, leads the kirkward pack 

Wi' Dauvit Groats. 

A' thocht ahint, in runkled breeks, 
A' spiled wi' lyin' by for weeks, 
The guidman follows closs, an' cleiks 

The sonsie missis ; 
His sarious face at aince bespeaks 

The day that this is. 



92 UNDERWOODS 

And aye an' while we nearer draw 
To whaur the kirkton lies alaw, 
Mair neebours, comin' saft an' slaw 

Frae here an' there, 
The thicker thrang the gate an' caw 

The stour in air. 

But hark ! the bells frae nearer clang ; 
To rowst the slaw, their sides they bang ; 
An' see ! black coats a'ready thrang 

The green kirkyaird ; 
And at the yett, the chestnuts spang 

That brocht the laird. 

The solemn elders at the plate 

Stand drinkin' deep the pride o' state : 

The practised hands as gash an' great 

As Lords o' Session ; 
The later named, a wee thing blate 

In their expression. 



A LOWDEN SABBATH MORN 93 

The prentit stanes that mark the deid, 
Wi' lengthened lip, the sarious read ; 
Syne wag a moraleesin' heid, 

An' then an' there 
Their hirplin' practice an' their creed 

Try hard to square. 

It's here our Merren lang has lain, 

A wee bewast the table-stane ; 

An' yon's the grave o' Sandy Blane ; 

An' further ower, 
The mither's brithers, dacent men ! 

Lie a' the fower. 

Here the guidman sail bide awee 
To dwall amang the deid ; to see 
Auld faces clear in fancy's e'e ; 

Belike to hear 
Auld voices fa'in saft an' slee 

On fancy's ear. 



94 UNDERWOODS 

Thus, on the day o' solemn things, 
The bell that in the steeple swings 
To fauld a scaittered faim'ly rings 

Its walcome screed; 
An' just a wee thing nearer brings 

The quick an' deid. 

But noo the bell is ringin' in ; 
To talc their places, folk begin ; 
The minister himseP will shiine 

Be up the gate, 
Filled fu' wi' clavers about sin 

An' man's estate. 

The tunes are up — Freiich, to be shiire, 
The faithfii' French, an' twa-three mair ; 
The auld prezentor, hoastin' sair, 

Wales out the portions, 
An' yirks the time into the air 

Wi' queer contortions. 



A LOWDEN SABBATH MORN 95 

Follows the prayer, the readin' next, 
An' than the fisslin' for the text — 
The twa-three last to find it, vext 

But kind o' proud ; 
An' than the peppermints are raxed, 

An' southernwood. 

For noo's the time whan pows are seen 
Nid-noddin' like a mandareen; 
When tenty mithers stap a preen 

In sleepin' weans; 
An' nearly half the parochine 

Forget their pains. 

There's just a waukrif ' twa or three : 
Thrawn commentautors sweer to 'gree, 
Weans glowrin' at the bumlin' bee 

On windie-glasses, 
Or lads that tak a keek a-glee 

At sonsie lasses. 



96 UNDERWOODS 

HimseP, meanwhile, frae whaur he cocks 
An' bobs belaw the soundin'-box, 
The treesures of his words unlocks 

Wi' prodigality, 
An' deals some unco dingin' knocks 

To infidality. 

Wi' sappy unction, hoo he burkes 
The hopes o' men that trust in works, 
Expounds the fau'ts o' ither kirks, 

An' shaws the best o' them 
No muckle better than mere Turks, 

When a's confessed o' them. 

Bethankit! what a bonny creed! 

What mair would ony Christian need ? — 

The braw words rumm'le ower his heid, 

Nor steer the sleeper; 
And in their restin' graves, the deid 

Sleep aye the deeper. 



A LOVVDEN SABBATH MORN 97 

Note. — It may be guessed by some that I had a certain parish in my 
eye, and this makes it proper I should add a word of disclamation. In 
my time there have been two ministers in that parish. Of the first I have 
a special reason to speak well, even had there been any to think ill. The 
second I have often met in private and long (in the due phrase) "sat 
under " in his church, and neither here nor there have I heard an 
unkind or ugly word upon his lips. The preacher of the text had thus no 
original in that particular parish; but when I was a boy, he might have 
been observed in many others ; he was then (like the schoolmaster) 
abroad; and by recent advices, it would seem he has not yet entirely 
disappeared. 



VI 
THE SPAEWIFE 

O, I wad like to ken — to the beggar-wife says I — 
Why chops are guid to brander and nane sae guid to fry. 
An' siller, that's sae braw to keep, is brawer still to gi'e. 

— Ifs gey an' easy spierin\ says the beggar-wife to me. 

O, I wad like to ken — to the beggar- wife says I — 

Hoo a' things come to be whaur we find them when we try, 

The lasses in their claes an' the fishes in the sea. 

— Ifs gey an' easy spierin\ says the beggar-wife to me. 

O, I wad like to ken — to the beggar-wife says I — 

Why lads are a' to sell an' lasses a' to buy ; 

An' naebody for dacency but barely twa or three. 

— It's gey an' easy spierin', says the beggar-wife to me. 



THE SPAEWIFE 



99 



O, I wad like to ken — to the beggar-wife says I — 

Gin death's as shiire to men as killin' is to kye, 

Why God has filled the yearth sae fu' o' tasty things to pree. 

— It's gey an' easy spierin', says the beggar-wife to me. 

O, I wad like to ken — to the beggar-wife says I — 
The reason o' the cause an' the wherefore o' the why, 
Wi' mony anither riddle brings the tear into my e'e. 

— If s gey an' easy spierin\ says the beggar- wife to me. 



VII 

THE BLAST— 1875 

It's rainin'. Weet's the gairden sod, 

Weet the lang roads whaur gangrels plod — 

A maist unceevil thing o' God 

In mid July — 
If ye'll just curse the sneckdraw, dod ! 

An' sae wull I ! 

He's a braw place in Heev'n, ye ken, 
An' lea's us puir, forjaskit men 
Clamjamfried in the but and ben 

He ca's the earth — 
A wee bit inconvenient den 

No muckle worth ; 



THE BLAST— 1875 

An' whiles, at orra times, keeks out, 
Sees what puir mankind are about ; 
An' if He can, I've little doubt, 

Upsets their plans ; 
He hates a' mankind, brainch and root, 

An a' that's man's. 

An' whiles, whan they tak heart again, 
An' life i' the sun looks braw an' plain, 
Doun comes a jaw o' droukin' rain 

Upon their honours — 
God sends a spate outovver the plain, 

Or mebbe thun'ers. 

Lord safe us, life's an unco thing! 
Simmer an' Winter, Yule an' Sprin, 
The damned, dour-heartit seasons bring 

A feck o' trouble. 
I wadnae try't to be a king — 

No, nor for double. 



UNDERWOODS 

But since we're in it, willy-nilly, 

We maun be watchfii', wise an' skilly, 

An' no mind ony ither billy, 

Lassie nor God. 
But drink — that's my best counsel till 'e : 

Sae tak the nod. 



VIII 
THE COUNTERBLAST— 1886 

My bonny man, the warld, it's true, 
Was made for neither me nor you ; 
It's just a place to warstle through, 

As Job confessed o't; 
And aye the best that we'll can do 

Is mak the best o't. 

There's rowth o' wrang, I'm free to say 
The simmer brunt, the winter blae, 
The face of earth a' fyled wi' clay 

An' dour wi' chuckies, 
An' life a rough an' land'art play 

For country buckies. 



104 UNDERWOODS 

An' food's anither name for clart ; 
An' beasts an' brambles bite an' scart ; 
An' what would we be like, my heart ! 

If bared o' claethin' ? 
— Aweel, I cannae mend your cart : 

It's that or naethin'. 

A feck o' folk frae first to last 

Have through this queer experience passed ; 

Twa-three, I ken, just damn an' blast 

The hale transaction ; 
But twa-three ithers, east an' wast, 

Fand satisfaction. 

Whaur braid the briery muirs expand, 

A waefu' an' a weary land, 

The bumblebees, a gowden band, 

Are blithely hingin' ; 
An' there the canty wanderer fand 

The laverock singin'. 



THE COUNTERBLAST — 1886 105 

Trout in the burn grow great as herr'n ; 
The simple sheep can find their fair'n' ; 
The wind blaws clean about the cairn 

Wi' caller air; 
The muircock an' the barefit bairn 

Are happy there. 

Sic-like the howes o' life to some : 

Green loans whaur they ne'er fash their thumb, 

But mark the muckle winds that come, 

Soopin' an' cool, 
Or hear the powrin' burnie drum 

In the shilfa's pool. 

The evil wi' the guid they tak; 
They ca' a gray thing gray, no black ; 
To a steigh brae, a stubborn back 

Addressin' daily; 
An' up the rude, unbieldy track 

O' life, gang gaily. 



106 UNDERWOODS 

What you would like's a palace ha', 
Or Sinday parlour dink an' braw 
Wi' a' things ordered in a raw 

By denty leddies. 
Weel, than, ye cannae hae't : that's a' 

That to be said is. 

An' since at life ye've taen the grue, 
An' winnae blithely hirsle through, 
Ye've fund the very thing to do — 

That's to drink speerit ; 
An' shiine we'll hear the last o' you — 

An' blithe to hear it ! 

The shoon ye coft, the life ye lead, 
Ithers will heir when aince ye're deid; 
They'll heir your tasteless bite o' breid, 

An' find it sappy ; 
They'll to your dulefii' house succeed, 

An' there be happy. 



THE COUNTERBLAST— 1886 107 

As whan a glum an' fractious wean 
Has sat an' sullened by his lane 
Till, wi' a rowstin' skelp, he's taen 

An' shoo'd to bed — 
The ither bairns a' fa' to play'n', 

As gleg's a gled. 



IX 
THE COUNTERBLAST IRONICAL 

It's strange that God should fash to frame 

The yearth and lift sae hie, 
An' clean forget to explain the same 

To a gentleman like me. 

They gutsy, donnered ither folk, 

Their weird they weel may dree ; 

But why present a pig in a poke 
To a gentleman like me ? 

They ither folk their parritch eat 

An' sup their sugared tea ; 
But the mind is no to be wyled wi' meat 

Wi' a gentleman like me. 






THE COUNTERBLAST IRONICAL 109 

They ither folk, they court their joes 

At gloamin' on the lea ; 
But they're made of a commoner clay, I suppose, 

Than a gentleman like me. 

They ither folk, for richt or wrang, 

They suffer, bleed, or dee; 
But a' thir things are an emp'y sang 

To a gentleman like me. 

It's a different thing that I demand, 

Tho' humble as can be — 
A statement fair in my Maker's hand 

To a gentleman like me: 

A clear account writ fair an' broad, 

An' a plain apologie ; 
Or the deevil a ceevil word to God 

From a gentleman like me. 



THEIR LAUREATE TO AN ACADEMY CLASS 
DINNER CLUB 

Dear Thamson class, whaure'er I gang 
It aye comes ower me wi' a spang : 
" Lordsake ! they Thamson lads — (deilhang 
Or else Lord mend them ! ) — 
An' that wanchancy annual sang 
I ne'er can send them I " 

Straucht, at the name, a trusty tyke, 
My conscience girrs ahint the dyke ; 
Straucht on my hinderlands I fyke 

To find a rhyme t' ye; 
Pleased — although mebbe no pleased-like — 

To gie my time t' ye. 



TO AN ACADEMY CLASS DINNER CLUB 

" Weel" an' says you, wi' heavin' breist, 
" Sae far, sae guid, but what's the neist ? 
Yearly we gaither to i 'he feast, 

A' hopefiV men — 
Yearly we skelloch 'Hang the beast — 
JVae sang again I ' " 

My lads, an' what am I to say ? 
Ye shiirely ken the Muse's way : 
Yestreen, as gleg's a tyke — the day, 

Thrawn like a cuddy : 
Her conduc', that to her's a play, 

Deith to a body. 

Aft whan I sat an' made my mane, 
Aft whan I laboured burd-alane, 
Fishin' for rhymes an' findin' nane, 

Or nane were fit for ye — 
Ye judged me cauld's a chucky stane — 

No car'n' a bit for ye ! 



UNDERWOODS 

But saw ye ne'er some pingein' bairn 

As weak as a pitaty-par'n' — 

Less iised wi' guidin' horse-shoe aim 

Than steerin' crowdie — 
Packed aff his lane, by moss an' cairn, 

To ca' the howdie. 

Wae's me, for the puir callant than ! 
He wambles like a poke o' bran, 
An' the lowse rein, as hard's he can, 

Pu's, trem'lin' handit; 
Till, blaff ! upon his hinderlan' 

Behauld him landit. 

Sic-like — I awn the weary fac' — 
Whan on my muse the gate I tak, 
An' see her gleed e'e raxin' back 

To keek ahint her ; — 
To me, the brig o' Heev'n gangs black 

As blackest winter. 



TO AN ACADEMY CLASS DINNER CLUB 113 

"Lordsake / we're aff" thinks I, "but whaur? 
On what abhorred an' whinny scaur, 
Or whammkd in what sea d 1 glaur, 

Will she desert me ? 
An' will she just disgrace? or waur — 

Will she no hurt me? " 

Kittle the quaere ! But at least 

The day I've backed the fashious beast, 

While she, wi' mony a spang an' reist, 

Flang heels ower bonnet ; 
An' a' triumphant — for your feast, 

Hae ! there's your sonnet! 



XI 
EMBRO HIE KIRK 

The Lord Himsel' in former days 
Waled out the proper times for praise 
An' named the proper kind o' claes 

For folk to preach in : 
Preceese and in the chief o' ways 

Important teachin'. 

He ordered a' things late and air' ; 
He ordered folk to stand at prayer. 
(Although I cannae just mind where 

He gave the warnin'.) 
An' pit pomatum on their hair 

On Sabbath mornin'. 



EMBRO HIE KIRK 115 

The hale o' life by His commands 
Was ordered to a body's hands ; 
But see! this corpus juris stands 

By a' forgotten; 
An' God's religion in a' lands 

Is deid an' rotten. 

While thus the lave o' mankind's lost, 
O' Scotland still God maks His boast — 
Puir Scotland, on whase barren coast 

A score or twa 
Auld wives wi' mutches an' a hoast 

Still keep His law. 

In Scotland, a wheen canty, plain, 

Douce, kintry-leevin' folk retain 

The Truth — or did so aince — alane • 

Of a' men leevin' ; 
An' noo just twa o' them remain — 

Just Begg an' Niven. 



Ii6 UNDERWOODS 

For noo, unfaithfu' to the Lord 
Auld Scotland joins the rebel horde ; 
Her human hymn-books on the board 

She noo displays : 
An' Embro Hie Kirk's been restored 

In popish ways. 

O punctum temporis for action 
To a' o' the reformin' faction, 
If yet, by ony act or paction, 

Thocht, word, or sermon, 
This dark an' damnable transaction 

Micht yet determine ! 

For see — as Doctor Begg explains — 
Hoo easy 't's dime ! a pickle weans, 
Wha in the Hie Street gaither stanes 

By his instruction, 
The uncovenantit, pentit panes 

Ding to destruction. 



EMBRO HIE KIRK 117 

Up, Niven, or ower late — an' dash 
Laigh in the glaur that carnal hash ; 
Let spires and pews wi' gran' stramash 

Thegether fa'; 
The rumlin' kist o' whustles smash 

In pieces sma'. 

Noo choose ye out a waie hammer ; 
About the knottit buttress clam'er ; 
Alang the steep roof stoyt an' stammer, 

A gate mis-chancy ; 
On the auP spire, the bells' hie cha'mer, 

Dance your bit dancie. 

Ding, devel, dunt, destroy, an' ruin, 
Wi' carnal stanes the square bestrewin', 
Till your loud chaps frae Kyle to Fruin, 

Frae Hell to Heeven, 
Tell the guid wark that baith are doin' — 

Baith Begg an' Niven. 



XII 

THE SCOTSMAN'S RETURN FROM ABROAD 
In a letter from Mr. Thomson to Mr. Johnstone. 

In mony a foreign pairt I've been, 

An' mony an unco ferlie seen, 

Since, Mr. Johnstone, you and I 

Last walkit upon Cocklerye. 

Wi' gleg, observant een, I pass't 

By sea an' land, through East an' Wast, 

And still in ilka age an' station 

Saw naething but abomination. 

In thir uncovenantit lands 

The gangrel Scot uplifts his hands 



THE SCOTSMAN'S RETURN FROM ABROAD 119 

At lack of a' sectarian fiish'n, 
An' cauld religious destitution. 
He rins, puir man, frae place to place, 
Tries a' their graceless means o' grace, 
Preacher on preacher, kirk on kirk — 
This yin a stot an' thon a stirk — 
A bletherin' clan, no warth a preen, 
As bad as Smith of Aiberdeen ! 

At last, across the weary faem, 
Frae far, outlandish pairts I came. 
On ilka side o' me I fand 
Fresh tokens o' my native land. 
Wi' whatna joy I hailed them a' — 
The hilltaps standin' raw by raw, 
The public house, the Hielan' birks, 
And a' the bonny U. P. kirks ! 
But maistly thee, the bluid o' Scots, 
Frae Maidenkirk to John o' Grots, 



UNDERWOODS 

The king o' drinks, as I conceive it, 
Talisker, Isla, or Glenlivet! 

For after years wi' a pockmantie 

Frae Zanzibar to Alicante, 

In mony a fash and sair affliction 

I gie't as my sincere conviction — 

Of a' their foreign tricks an' pliskies, 

I maist abominate their whiskies. 

Nae doot, themsels, they ken it weel, 

An' wi' a hash o' leemon peel, 

And ice an' siccan filth, they ettle 

The stawsome kind o' goo to settle ; 

Sic wersh apothecary's broos wi' 

As Scotsmen scorn to fyle their moo's wi'. 

An', man, I was a blithe hame-comer 
Whan first I syndit out my rummer. 
Ye should hae seen me then, wi' care 
The less important pairts prepare ; 



THE SCOTSMAN'S RETURN FROM ABROAD 121 

Syne, weel contentit wi' it a', 
Pour in the speerits wi' a jaw ! 
I didnae drink, I didnae speak, — 
I only snowkit up the reek. 
I was sae pleased therin to paidle, 
I sat an' plowtered wi' my ladle. 

An' blithe was I, the morrow's morn, 
To daunder through the stookit corn, 
And after a' my strange mishanters, 
Sit doun amang my ain dissenters. 
An', man, it was a joy to me 
The pu'pit an' the pews to see, 
The pennies dirlin' in the plate, 
The elders lookin' on in state ; 
An' 'mang the first, as it befell, 
Wha should I see, sir, but yoursel' ! 

I was, and I will no deny it, 
At the first gliff a hantle tryit 



UNDERWOODS 

To see yoursel' in sic a station — 

It seemed a doubtfii' dispensation. 

The feelin' was a mere digression; 

For shiine I understood the session, 

An' mindin' Aiken an' M'Neil, 

I wondered they had dune sae weel. 

I saw I had mysel' to blame ; 

For had I but remained at name, 

Aiblins — though no ava' deservin' 't — 

They micht hae named your humble servant. 

The kirk was filled, the door was steeked; 
Up to the pu'pit ance I keeked ; 
I was mair pleased than I can tell — 
It was the minister himsel'! 
Proud, proud was I to see his face, 
After sae lang awa' frae grace. 
Pleased as I was, I'm no denyin' 
Some maitters were not edifyin' ; 



THE SCOTSMAN'S RETURN FROM ABROAD 123 

For first I fand — an' here was news ! — 

Mere hymn-books cockin' in the pews — 

A humanised abomination, 

Unfit for ony congregation. 

Syne, while I still was on the tenter, 

I scunnered at the new prezentor; 

I thocht him gesterin' an' cauld — 

A sair declension frae the auld. 

Syne, as though a' the faith was wreckit, 

The prayer was not what I'd exspeckit. 

Himsel', as it appeared to me, 

Was no the man he used to be. 

But just as I was growin' vext 

He waled a maist judeecious text, 

An', launchin' into his prelections, 

Swoopt, wi' a skirl, on a' defections. 

O what a gale was on my speerit 
To hear the p'ints o' doctrine clearit, 



I2 4 UNDERWOODS 

And a' the horrors o' damnation 
Set furth wi' faithfu' ministration! 
Nae shauchlin' testimony here — 
We were a' damned, an' that was clear. 
I owned, wi' gratitude an' wonder, 
He was a pleisure to sit under. 



XIII 

Late in the nicht in bed I lay, 
The winds were at their weary play, 
An' tirlin' wa's an' skirlin' wae 

Through Heev'n they battered ; • 
On-ding o' hail, on-blaff o' spray, 

The tempest blattered. 

The masoned house it dinled through ; 
It dung the ship, it cowped the coo'; 
The rankit aiks it overthrew, 

Had braved a' weathers ; 
The Strang sea-gleds it took an' blew 

Awa' like feathers. 



126 UNDERWOODS 



The thrawes o' fear on a' were shed, 
An' the hair rose, an' slumber fled, 
An' lichts were lit an' prayers were said 

Through a' the kintry ; 
An' the cauld terror clum in bed 

Wi' a' an' sindry. 

To hear in the pit-mirk on hie 

The brangled collieshangie flie, 

The warl', they thocht, wi' land an' sea, 

Itsel' wad cowpit ; 
An' for auld aim, the smashed debris 

By God be rowpit. 

Meanwhile frae far Aldeboran, 
To folks wi' talescopes in han', 
O' ships that cowpit, winds that ran, 

Nae sign was seen, 
But the wee warl' in sunshine span 

As bricht's a preen. 



LATE IN THE NIGHT 127 

I, tae, by God's especial grace, 
Dwall denty in a bieldy place, 
Wi' hosened feet, wi' shaven face, 

Wi' dacent mainners : 
A grand example to the race 

O' tautit sinners! 

The wind may blaw, the heathen rage, 
The deil may start on the rampage ; — 
The sick in bed, the thief in cage — 

What's a' to me ? 
Cosh in my house, a sober sage, 

I sit an' see. 

An' whiles the bluid spangs to my bree, 
To lie sae saft, to live sae free, 
While better men maun do an' die 

In unco places. 
" IV/iaur's God? " I cry, an' " Whae is me 
To hae sic graces ? " 



128 UNDERWOODS 

I mind the fecht the sailors keep, 
But fire or can'le, rest or sleep, 
In darkness an' the muckle deep ; 

An' mind beside 
The herd that on the hills o' sheep 

Has wandered wide. 

I mind me on the hoastin' weans — 
The penny joes on causey stanes — 
The auld folk wi' the crazy banes, 

Baith auld an' puir, 
That aye maun thole the winds an' rains. 

An' labour sair. 

An' whiles I'm kind o' pleased a blink, 
An' kind o' fleyed forby, to think, 
For a' my rowth o' meat an' drink 

An' waste o' crumb, 
I'll mebbe have to thole wi' skink 

In Kingdom Come. 



LATE IN THE NICHT 129 

For God whan jowes the Judgment bell, 
Wi' His ain Hand, His Leevin' SeF, 
Sail ryve the guid (as Prophets tell) 

Frae them that had it ; 
And in the reamin' pat o' Hell, 

The rich be scaddit. 

O Lord, if this indeed be sae, 
Let daw that sair an' happy day ! 
Again' the warl', grawn auld an' gray, 

Up wi' your aixe ! 
An' let the puir enjoy their play — 

I'll thole my paiks. 



XIV 
MY CONSCIENCE! 

Of a' the ills that flesh can fear, 
The loss o' frien's, the lack o' gear, 
A yowlin' tyke, a glandered mear, 

A lassie's nonsense — 
There's just ae thing I cannae bear, 

An' that's my conscience. 

Whan day (an' a' excuse) has gane, 
An' wark is dime, and duty's plain, 
An' to my chalmer a' my lane 

I creep apairt, 
My conscience ! hoo the yammerin' pain 

Stends to my heart ! 



MY CONSCIENCE! 131 

A' day wi' various ends in view 
The hairsts o' time I had to pu', 
An' made a hash wad staw a soo, 

Let be a man ! — 
My conscience! whan my han's were fu', 

Whaur were ye then ? 

An' there were a' the lures o' life, 
There pleesure skirlin' on the fife, 
There anger, wi' the hotchin' knife 

Ground shairp in Hell — 
My conscience ! — you that's like a wife ! — 

Whaur was yoursel' ? 

I ken it fine : just waitin' here, 

To gar the evil waur appear, 

To clart the guid, confuse the clear, 

Misca' the great, 
My conscience ! an' to raise a steer 

Whan a's ower late. 



132 UNDERWOODS 

Sic-like, some tyke grawn auld and blind, 
Whan thieves brok' through the gear to p'ind, 
Has lain his dozened length an' grinned 

At the disaster; 
An' the morn's mornin', wud's the wind, 

Yokes on his master. 



XV 
TO DOCTOR JOHN BROWN 

( Whan the dear doctor, dear to a\ 
Was still among us here belaw, 
I set my pipes his praise to blaw 

Wi' a' my speerit ; 
But noo, Dear Doctor! he's awa\ 

An' ne'er can hear it.) 

By Lyne and Tyne, by Thames and Tees, 

By a' the various river-Dee's, 

In Mars and Manors 'yont the seas 

Or here at hame, 
Whaure'er there's kindly folk to please, 

They ken your name. 



134 UNDERWOODS 

They ken your name, they ken your tyke, 
They ken the honey from your byke ; 
But mebbe after a' your fyke, 

(The truth to tell) 
It's just your honest Rab they like, 

An' no yoursel'. 

As at the gowff, some canny play'r 
Should tee a common ba' wi' care — 
Should flourish and deleever fair 

His souple shintie — 
An' the ba' rise into the air, 

A leevin' lintie : 

Sae in the game we writers play, 
There comes to some a bonny day, 
When a dear ferlie shall repay 

Their years o' strife, 
An' like you Rab, their things o' clay, 

Spreid wings o' life. 



TO DOCTOR JOHN BROWN 135 

Ye scarce deserved it, I'm afraid — 
You that had never learned the trade, 
But just some idle mornin' strayed 

Into the schiile, 
An' picked the fiddle up an' played 

Like Neil himsel'. 

Your e'e was gleg, your fingers dink ; 
Ye didnae fash yoursel' to think, 
But wove, as fast as puss can link, 

Your denty wab : — 
Ye stapped your pen into the ink, 

An' there was Rab ! 

Sinsyne, whaure'er your fortune lay 
By dowie den, by canty brae, 
Simmer an' winter, nicht an' day, 

Rab was aye wi' ye ; 
An' a' the folk on a' the way 

Were blithe to see ye. 



136 UNDERWOODS 

O sir, the gods are kind indeed, 
An' hauld ye for an honoured heid, 
That for a wee bit clarkit screed 

Sae weel reward ye, 
An' lend — puir Rabbie bein' deid — 

His ghaist to guard ye. 

For though, whaure'er yoursel' may be, 
We've just to turn an' glisk a wee, 
An' Rab at heel we're shure to see 

Wi' gladsome caper : 
The bogle of a bogle, he — 

A ghaist o' paper ! 

And as the auld-farrand hero sees 

In Hell a bogle Hercules, 

Pit there the lesser deid to please, 

While he himsel' 
Dwalls wi' the muckle gods at ease 

Far raised frae hell : 



TO DOCTOR JOHN BROWN 137 

Sae the true Rabbie far has gane 

On kindlier business o' his ain 

Wi' aulder frien's ; an' his breist-bane 

An' stumpie tailie, 
He birstles at a new hearth stane 

By James and Ailie. 



XVI 

It's an owercome sooth for age an' youth 

And it brooks wi' nae denial, 
That the dearest friends are the auldest friends 

And the young are just on trial. 

There's a rival bauld wi' young an' auld 

And it's him that has bereft me ; 
For the surest friends are the auldest friends 

And the maist o' mines hae left me. 

There are kind hearts still, for friends to fill 
And fools to take and break them ; 

But the nearest friends are the auldest friends 
And the grave's the place to seek them. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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